The seven men landed at the Old Port and talked to the pioneers.
They listened to their dismal accounts of starvation on roast
flathead and mutton-birds' eggs, of the ferocity of the blacks, of
the murder of Macalister, of the misfortunes of Glengarry. The
nine-pounder gun still stood at the corner of the company's store,
pointed towards the scrub, a silent warning to the new men of the
dangers in store for them. They took their guns and went about the
bush looking for wattle trees, but they could not find in any place a
sufficient quantity to make the business profitable. There was no
regular employment to be had, but fortunately the schooner 'Scotia',
chartered by John King, went ashore in a gale, and four of the
barkers, all Irishmen obtained a few days' work in taking out her mud
ballast. But no permanent livelihood could be expected from
shipwrecks, and the seven strippers resolved, if possible, to return
to Melbourne. They wanted to see Paddy Walsh once more, but they had
no money, and the storekeeper refused to pay their fare by sea.
After much negotiation, they obtained a week's rations, and gave all
the tools they had brought with them to Captain Davy in payment for
his trouble in landing them at One Tree Hill. They were informed
that Brodribb and Hobson had made Western Port in four days on foot,
and of course they could do the same.
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